What he saw was too many prisoners, in too cramped space, guarded by too few corrections officers. "We've got to do something about the number of inmates," he said.

Alabama legislators, who budget the money that state prisons operate on and pass the laws that send offenders to prison, should make similar visits to the state lockups. Maybe they would come away with a greater appreciation for the need for sentencing reform.

Riley is a believer. A week after visiting Donaldson prison in western Jefferson County and the Birmingham Work Release Center, the governor spent four hours Monday in four prisons in Elmore County. With his prison commissioner, Donal Campbell, at his side, Riley saw 356 men at Staton prison packed like sardines in a windowless sheetmetal building that used to be canning factory. At times, he was told, there's only one officer to watch over the convicts.

Despite the progress the state has made since Riley took office less than two years ago - under the gun of federal and state courts - Alabama prisons remain dangerously overcrowded and understaffed. Some 23,600 inmates are still crammed into space for 12,400.

Riley has reduced prison crowding by speeding up paroles, expanding community corrections and sending some inmates to private, out-of-state prisons. But more needs to be done: more drug and mental health treatment programs, more work release and more community-based options.

And, of course, the state must move forward with common-sense changes in how judges mete out punishment. The Legislature can do that by passing into law the recommendations of the Alabama Sentencing Commission.

The commission spent four years examining sentencing in the state, reviewing some 14,000 criminal cases. It found that sentences can range widely for the same crime, that sentences handed out hardly resemble actual times served, and that habitual offender laws needlessly lock up some nonviolent offenders for long periods.

The commission's recommendations are designed to bring more consistency, honesty and fairness through new voluntary sentencing guidelines. They would lower minimum sentence ranges for certain crimes and tighten them for others, while not changing sentences for more serious crimes such as murder, rape and robbery.

It is a smart form of truth in sentencing.

Alabama's prison system didn't get in such wretched shape by state officials being smart. And lawmakers weren't truthful to the people of this state about how their tough-on-crime laws helped fuel the explosion in the prison population.

They have a chance to change that. Riley sees that. Lawmakers need to see it, too, even if it means having to spend some time behind bars.